![]() My intent here is to provide a timeline of the most important advances and “greatest hits” in the ever-evolving development of astrophotography within the larger context of truth in photography. This post is by no means a comprehensive history of astrophotography, nor does it explore the important topics of spectroscopy or photometry which both developed concurrently with astrophotography. In exploring this question, I find it helpful to gain a historical perspective of the incremental advances in photographic and telescopic technology that led to the development and launch of Hubble. Given how far-removed Hubble’s vision is from our own experience of looking up, it is only natural to question the reality of these images. Hubble’s clarity of vision and its vivid and colorful views of the cosmos are a relatively new phenomenon in the world of astrophotography. Indeed, for many thousands of years, and even in the humble beginnings of astrophotography, this was how humanity saw and interpreted the night sky. Even in the darkest skies I’ve ever seen, I’ve clearly seen the Milky Way, and countless stars with just barely discernible colors, but still, I do not see anything close to what Hubble sees. After all, when I step outside at night and look up, I see a mostly dark (or more likely light polluted) sky peppered with pinpoints of light. I remember seeing images like the now iconic Eagle Nebula as I was beginning my own journey into astrophysics and wondering how these images could possibly be real. ![]() ![]() Three decades is a long time, it covers the span of an entire generation a generation whose perception of what the universe looks like is inextricably linked to Hubble. The Hubble Space Telescope was launched in 1990 and is now approaching thirty-one years in orbit. In this post, we’ll take a brief look at the history of astrophotography in order to provide a historical context to Hubble. This series of posts is dedicated to the scrutiny of Hubble imagery and a broader discussion of the veracity of astronomical imagery.
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